Sorry it’s been such a long time since you’ve heard from us! At the moment, we are feeling thankful for God’s constancy and faithfulness, especially during this year that has been marked by a lot of change for us in our work and family life. The most important and joyful change is our rapidly growing little boy, John. He is a treasure, and we're enjoying life with him so far. We welcome your prayers for strength and wisdom, and for the ability to be loving partners and parents.

I (Josh) have experienced quite a bit of change in my work, as several of my colleagues transitioned out of their roles this year, including:

Iantha Scheiwe, executive director of CWEF and my long-time supervisor, who stepped down in mid-April in order to spend more time with her family in Hong Kong.

Ashley Wong, our service teams coordinator, finished up her time with us and has returned to San Francisco to serve in her home church there.

James and Brittany Baumgartner, and daughter Nora, are in the process of relocating from Shanghai to Latin America due to air pollution-related health issues for Nora.

I’m very thankful to have had the opportunity to work with and learn from these wonderful and capable people, and I welcome you to join us in asking our Father to guide and bless them richly in the next season of their lives.

I’m also very thankful that He has provided another wonderful co-worker in Persephone James, who has assumed the role of interim executive director for CWEF. Please ask Him to give her strength and wisdom as she settles into her work of guiding CWEF into its next stage. Ask that she and I would keep our hearts and minds wide open to His leading, and that in faith we would listen, hear and obey.

At the moment, we would specifically like to ask for your prayers for recruitment. We are currently interviewing candidates for a couple positions: Serving Learning Coordinator and China Programs Director. We are trusting Him to provide the right people at just the right time.

At this point, I would like to once again direct you to an article from our most recent CWEF newsletter. It’s about a new program called GROW that we are currently developing in China’s Guangdong province: university students who received support from us during their high school years are organizing themselves into a volunteer group that is reaching out to ‘left-behind’ students at a rural village school we have been partnering with. You can find the full article written by my colleague Dolphin Liu, along with a video at https://www.cwef.org.hk/worth-the-wait. I’ll share an excerpt here:

From December 13th-16th, 2014, 6 university volunteers, who were previously CWEF high school recipients, held a service activity in Sibao Primary school. They completed home visits for 33 left-behind kids, they provided 1 day of English, PE & Music lessons to local students. They also held a Christmas party for local students and teachers. As for me, I only needed to be a photographer & instructor — not an organizer this time, which has never happened before.

Watching the university volunteers, I was reminded that I did home visits for 3 of them five years ago. I still remember how nervous and shy they were when I first met them. But this time, they are the ones to do the home visits with the left-behind children. They are the ones who provided their love, care and comfort to others. Now, those shy girls have become confident and mature volunteers, who are also good at talking with local people. Just like what we did. Five years ago when I first met these young women, I did not imagine this would happen.

It’s exciting for us to see this fruit being born out of our team’s service to these young women over the years. Praise Him for this encouraging development, and ask that He would use this new program for His glory and the development of His kingdom.To close out, we have a few more personal prayer requests:

For continued healing and recovery for Josh’s mom Sylvia, who underwent emergency colectomy surgery in May while visiting us here in Shanghai.

For Josh’s sister-in-law Sandra, who has recently begun chemotherapy treatment for breast cancer.